Tuesday, April 28, 2009

My weekend in Washington

Last weekend I accomplished the following:

1. Hung out with a great friend
2. Ate some really good food- Lemongrass fish, with a side of man sauce
3. The shopping victory of the year
4. Bought a great antique watch- it's a wind up, but it's the best watch I've ever had, with a price tag of $9.95
5. Made a beaded bracelet with fourteen 8 year-olds
6. Caught up on much needed sleep
7. Filled myself with love from the Bahaiim
8. Saw a great concert
9. Did a drive by on the big white house
10. Decided that I really liked DC

Monday, April 20, 2009

Vocabulary Entry #2

Please keep in mind that this is a direct quote in reference to a partner's son:

"He is the splitting image of his father."

Saturday, April 11, 2009

A victory like none other

The last 8 months of my life have been filled with crazy dating scenarios which I have refrained from disclosing completely to protect myself while in the midst of my divorce. Now that everything is final, I might start sharing some of them, as they are highly entertaining. The few people that I do share these vignettes with laugh out loud because, as unbelievable as it is, yes, the world is filled with men like the one I am about to write about.

I'll call him Oz...that is his name, even though it seems very made up. Oz and I met last summer at a bar/lounge in Houston that I was frequenting. I was actually interested in his friend, who was very good looking, and not so much into Oz himself. But somehow Oz wound up with my number and came to the house that night to hang out with Julia and I and whoever else showed up at the Beverly Hill Hotel, as it is now called. It was 4am and the next day I probably had the biggest gig of my life, the 500 person wedding with 8 performances. And yet I stayed up talking and making out with Oz all night. I think I slept 3hours that night (shocker). At 9am I woke up Oz because I had to go- he begged me to stay for 10 minutes more, but I refused. The reality was that I had a big day ahead of me and you, whom I just met, are very insignificant.

Two days and many text messages and phone calls later, Oz spent the night at my house and then proceeded to fall off the face of the planet. I will spare you most of the details but a typical week would go like this:

Receive text message from Oz
Respond
Get NO response from Oz
See him out at a club that night
Make plans to hook up at 3am after clubbing and late night eating was over
Oz passes out in his car somewhere and never shows up- supposedly
Oz calls the next day to apologize, Jen sets the record straight
The whole cycle starts all over again

Then things get really strange... I start seeing him everywhere that I go. I can't go to a bar, a club, a lounge, an eatery, anywhere on any given night of the week without him showing up. And I'm just minding my own business- not even looking for him. Then, at some point when I see him out, he starts completely ignoring me. Acting as if he has no idea who I am and yet, every time I whip around on the dance floor at a club he's staring right at me. I can't get away from him and I can't get close to him. It begins to drive me mad. So I go into extreme combat mode- I too begin to completely ignore him while out.

Then I move.

Then I go home for a visit last weekend. I'm not in Houston for an hour and see his car at the CVS when Julia and I stop to pick up some asprin or something. There was no actual spotting of his face, since we avoided him and got in and out as quickly as possible, but nonetheless...he was around. That night at VanBuuren we look below our stunning VIP Booth and see he and his best friend standing and looking up at us. Then Saturday night I drive past the late night eatery and there is his car, again. I had to seize the opportunity. I went in to find him alone sitting at the bar eating. With no hesitation, I just plopped down next to him and started talking. We walked out and I said "well, I guess I'll see you in 6 weeks." He looked puzzled and asked why I would see him in 6 weeks. I said, well I don't live here anymore but will be back for a visit in 6 weeks, and in case you haven't noticed, we have the same social schedule and I am sure that I will run into you. I also made a couple of other references about his incessant going out and "misbehaving", comments which he was highly offended by. Comments which prompted him to walk around to my side of the car, put his hands on either side of my face and stick his tongue down my throat. I WIN! Finally victory is mine. At some point, I pulled away and said "I have to go now" and got in my car and drove off as quickly as I could, shaking after the whole scene. I didn't care what happened after that. I just know that I won. About 5 minutes later I get the first text message, summoning me to him to continue what we had started in the parking lot. I, of course, oblige because I just couldn't resist. The next morning I woke up, informed him that I had to go, kissed him and left him standing in his apartment alone and am still feeling the pangs of the victory.

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Tales from the Train

Every morning I wake up at 6:30, shower, get dressed, make my coffee and rush out the door with my Aunt and Cousin to head into the city. My Aunt and I find seats on the train and nestle in for the 50 minute commute to Grand Central Station.

I've gotten to be a real commuter over the last four weeks. There is a whole strategy involved in mastering the public transportation system in NYC. You know you are accomplished when you can identify the exact spot on the platform where the doors for the train will open, and select which end of the train you will take your seat on according to where you will be heading once you arrive, and when you get the point where you don't even look at the conductor when he's asking you for your ticket, but instead flash the inside of your wallet at him-- you've arrived. You must always read something on the train. If you aren't reading, you are clearly an amateur. Also, there is no talking. If my Aunt and I are on the train sipping our coffee and reading the Times and two women get on who are talking, we look at each other and mouth the words "talkers" to each other, snicker and look back down at the paper. There is also a whole strategy in choosing the right seat and maintaining some personal space around you. We have it down. We sit in the seating areas right by the doors with seats facing each other and place our bags on the seat beside us- then we honker down and read. We have figured out that if you create an invisible force field of attitude around you, you get to retain your space. It's an art form at this point.

Then there is the crisis and victory which goes along with professional commuting. The other night I was hanging out with a co-worker watching basketball until late. Now I don't have a car so once I get off the train at home, either my aunt has to pick me up or I take a cab from the station to her house. Well I didn't realize the cabs stop running so early from my normal train stop, so I reserved a cab from a larger station in the next town over for 1:00am. I had to catch the 12:06 to make it in time. It was a Friday night and I was about 18 blocks away. I left the bar with plenty of time to catch a cab and make it to Grand Central for the train. But every cab was already taken, so I started walking in the direction of G.C. thinking that at some point I'll grab a cab the rest of the way. Well I didn't and the next thing I know it's 11:59 and I am 6 blocks away. So I start running with a huge bag that contains any earthly possession you might need when commuting - an umbrella, a change of shoes, copious amounts of reading materials. And I run into Grand Central glance at the board see that my train is on the first track inside the doors and make a B-line for the gate. I run onto the train just as the beeping sound started going off and the doors started to close. I MADE IT! Victory!

The next night I went into the city to shop and hang out and caught the 9:22 back out to Chappequa. Well... I wasn't in a hurry this night because I had a rental car at the lot and didn't have to pay for a cab or ask my aunt to go out of her way to get me late. And then, I fell asleep on the train. I've never done that before. And as I wake up, we are pulling away from my stop where I have a car and am only 10 minutes from my bed. So I had to get off at the next stop- the stop with all of the cabs, pay to take a cab back to the other train station and delay my sleeping time by 35 minutes. Crisis.

The thing about public transportation is that there is always something crazy to experience.

Monday, April 6, 2009

An article I read today

Today I was reading on the train- par usual. I read an article about how this 17 year old in the UK painted a gigantic penis on the roof of his house hoping that it would show up on Google Earth. A helicopter pilot happened to spot it from the sky and reported the art to the owner of the house, the boy's father. When the father asked "son, did you paint a penis on our roof?" the boy responded "oh, you found it?"

I have yet to stop laughing.

Sunday, April 5, 2009

A weekend to remember

There are so many details to share about this last weekend in Houston. Needless to say I was in rare form, outdoing myself every second- and a bit out of control. Here are my stats:

Dancing- 9 hours total
Making out with my boyfriends- 6 hours total (don't judge me)
Sleeping- 5 hours total
Getting my house together- 6 hours total
Just hanging out- 20 hours
Flying time- 7.5 hours total

It made for a great 48 hour period of my life.

Thursday, April 2, 2009

Vocabulary

I have to keep you all entertained with the vocabulary of my co-worker, which I mentioned in an earlier post. Here are a few more:

Loot- "Jen, please keep me in the loot with what is going on in the Conference Center."

All Informed (and a cameo by loot) "Jen, if you make a change to the schedule, please keep me in the loot as I need to be the all informed." (sounded like a title of a profit from God, but who am I to say?)

Oh and today it was a turquoise blue shirt with, you guessed it, turquoise eye shadow.